FicWad

Chapter 4: Up On the Roof

Tsunade sat on the circular roof of the Hokage headquarters building, her back against a wall below the railings, the six arching spines towering above her as they jutted from the top of the wall. An empty sake bottle sat near her and she was taking a pull from another one. With one knee drawn up and the other leg stretched out in front of her, she gazed up at the sky, watching the clouds slowly pass across the stars and move on.

"You shouldn't drink alone," she heard someone say. "It's unsociable."

I came up here to get away from everybody. Annoyed, Tsunade turned her head in the direction of the voice. "Hmm! When did you blow into town?"

"Oh, a little while ago." Jiraiya sat perched on the railing, his arms crossed. He watched her for a few minutes. "Nice night."

Tsunade gave a hint of a shrug. "I guess."

"Mind if I sit and help you stare at the sky?"

Tsunade closed her eyes. "Do what you like."

"Oh, goody!" He hopped down from the railing and strolled over to her. With a slight grunt, he sat down next to her and picked up the sake bottle. He took a few swallows of it and gave a satisfied sigh. Setting it back on the ground, he glanced at Tsunade out of the corner of his eye. "Word on the street is you have yourself a little problem."

"Huh!" Tsunade gave a short laugh. "Yeah, sucks to be me." She glanced back at him. "What exactly have you heard?"

"Well, why don't you give me your version first."

"You want the short version or the screaming psychobitch version?"

"Um..." Jiraiya hesitated. "As tempting as the other sounds, give me the short version."

"Fine." Rubbing her forehead, Tsunade took a deep breath. "Kakashi got Sakura pregnant."

Jiraiya waited for her to say more, but she remained silent. "Okay," he said after a few moments. "How about the psychobitch version. Preferably without the screaming?"

Tsunade thrust her chin up and banged the back of her head against the wall a few times. "I can't believe this is happening!" she groaned between clenched teeth.

"Whoa, hey!" Jiraiya put his hand behind her head, wincing as it got crushed against the wall. "Take it easy on the masonry."

"What were they thinking?" Tsunade cried, her disbelief still fresh. "He's nearly twice her age! She was supposed to be mooning over that Uchiha boy! What sort of line did Kakashi hand her to get her into bed with him?" She glared at Jiraiya. "Probably something out of one of those stupid books of yours!" She hauled back a fist to slug him.

Jiraiya held up his hands. "Hold on! Don't blame me!" Tsunade gave a snort of disgust and threw her hand up dismissively. "Do you know how long this had been going on?"

Tsunade frowned. After a moment of hesitation, she mumbled, "A couple of years, apparently."

Jiraiya raised his eyebrows in surprise. "A couple of years?" He sat for a moment, digesting this information. "Wow. That's hardly just handing her a line. That's sounds like a courtship." Tsunade said nothing, and he asked, "What has the girl told you?"

Tsunade put a finger to her mouth and chewed on a nail. "Not much. She barely talks to me about anything anymore."

"I see."

"It's just 'yes, Hokage-sama," or 'yes, Tsunade-sensei'. She's-" Tsunade bit her lower lip. "She's closed herself off from me," she said quietly.

"So...what about Kakashi?" Jiraiya asked. "I understand you've got him locked up in his own apartment."

"Yeah?"

"For how long? I mean, are you going to have him tried for statutory rape or anything like that? Do you want to send him to prison?"

Tsunade drew her other knee up and propped her elbows on them, pressing her hands to her forehead. "I don't know! I don't know!" she wailed. "I've got the council breathing down my neck about him, but if I do that to him, Sakura will hate me and I'll-" Her voice caught in her throat and she stopped.

"You'll what?" Jiraiya prompted her, knowing fairly well what she was going to say. But she remained silent. He regarded her with shrewd affection for a moment and gave her a little nudge with his shoulder. "Come on, Tsunade, this is me you're talking to. Just being pregnant and having a baby is not going to keep her from her studies. What is it really?"

Tsunade slumped a little against the wall. "All the time she was seeing him, she kept it from me," she finally murmured bitterly. "I had absolutely no idea. All the time she spent devoting herself to her training and her studies, and all the time he spent on his brilliant missions and training Naruto and reading those stinking books of his, they were-" She pursed her lips tightly to hold back a sob, and tears spilled from her eyes.

Jiraiya put an arm around her shoulder and pulled her to him. She resisted for a moment, then leaned against him, quietly crying.

"So it's not really the baby you're so broken up about. Sakura was your protégée, your pride and joy, and you feel like you lost her to someone else."

Tsunade gave a mute, reluctant nod.

"And it wasn't to some dumb kid who you could scare away and who she'd probably get over in time. It was to the great Hatake Kakashi!" Jiraiya said dramatically. "The legendary genius of Konoha, and very tough competition for a girl's loyalty. Just hit me if I'm getting close."

Tsunade gave him a half-hearted punch in the arm.

"Ooh! So, do you want me to go on? Or do you want to finish up?"

Tsunade sniffed and wiped the back of her hand across her nose. "You seem to be on a roll, smartass. Go ahead."

"Very well. So you put him under lock and key, sort of, and you haven't quite decided what to do with him. If you just keep him there or, better yet, toss his ass in prison, Sakura will hate you forever, and it's pretty likely she won't name her baby after you. If you forgive him and let him go, not only will she go flying to him away from you, and you will still feel like you've lost her, but you will have undermined your own authority as well as your street cred as a tough-as-nails-um-I hesitate to say psychobitch, but you know what I mean."

Tsunade sat quietly in his arms for a few several moments. Finally she looked up at him with a tear-stained face. "I don't know what to do, Jiraiya."

"It'll come to you organically."

Tsunade stared at him. "What?"

"It's something we writers do," Jiraiya said with knowing, superior air. "When we get a really bad case of writer's block, we sort of wait for the just the right thing to come to us naturally. It just sort of hits us, and we think to ourselves, 'this is good. This feels right.'"

Tsunade gave a sigh. "Fine. So while I'm sitting around waiting for that to happen, everyone in the village is practically at each other's throats over this." She shifted a little more comfortably, leaning her head against Jiraiya's. "You know, I'm almost tempted to send him on a mission, but I'm afraid he'd just disappear."

Jiraiya thought for a moment, then said, "Well, there you are."

"Where?"

"Do that. Send him on a mission."

Tsunade looked at him dubiously, but after a few moments, she mused, "It would be the perfect test."

"Exactly. Set him loose. If he disappears, then there's nothing more to be done. He'll be a missing-nin with a hefty price on his head. But if he comes back, well..."

"For one thing, he'll prove his loyalty to Konoha," Tsunade observed.

"Yes, yes," Jiraiya countered impatiently. "He'll also prove that he's serious about his relationship with Sakura and that she wasn't just a quick tumble. Come on," he went on as Tsunade gave a slight scowl. "What would you honestly rather have? A lost, extremely valuable jonin and a miserably unhappy student who will probably hate your guts? Or a protégé who is grateful and obliging because she's been reunited with the man she loves who, to be realistic, happens to be one of the village's major cash cows?"

Tsunade was not entirely convinced. "She's still a child."

"Hardly. Besides, that won't last forever, as much as you'd like it to."

Tsunade considered this for a while. She had not been able to get the memory out of her mind of the two of them locked in each other's arms, saying their good byes, nor had she been able to completely battle the guilt she felt but refused to admit to. "Well," she said finally. "If the opportunity arises, I just might give it a try. Then I guess we'll see what happens." She looked at him and managed a smile. "Thanks."

"Oh..." Jiraiya shrugged. "You would have figured it out sooner or later. That's why you're the Hokage."